Heart, Jan Stawasz

Jan's Heart

Jan Stawasz shares his heart pattern from his new book, "Tatted Treasures." Experienced tatters will recognize that this is his homage to the late master tatter, Mary Konior. (See his acknowledgement on the diagram.) Jan has taken an edging motif, one seen many times on vintage hankies and doilies and rearranged it in a heart design. A reversed motif creates the cleavage of the heart. An extra chain with a floating cloverleaf forms the point. Chains without picots emphasize the upper lobes of the heart.

The tatter's first impulse is to get out the thread and start tatting this heart right away. But, if you really want to master Jan's Method, you need to study the tutorial he has posted online and published in each of his books. It requires a shift in the position of the picot.

The modern method of picot placement is:

double stitch, picot, double stitch

Jan's method of picot placement is:

first half stitch, picot, second half stitch

On the diagram note that the lines for the picots are preceded and followed by a dot. The dot indicates the first half stitch followed by the picot line followed by another dot which indicates the second half stitch. Other numbers indicate double stitches.